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MEMOIR OF DAXIEL TKEADWELL. 



vent my succeeding, all connected with the extreme caution and narrow views of the printers. 

 The system on which a person is brought up to a trade in London makes him mechanically 

 perfect in it as it is there practised, but altogether prevents him from acquiring the philosophy 

 of it, as is very often the case with people in our own country. ... I shall leave my concern 

 in a way that it will probably get along slowly, and on my return to America I hope to get vp 

 an establishment that will not depend on a trade for its success. 



I am quite disappointed in the English mechanicians. I find none among them men of 

 enlarged, well-arranged minds, and I have had opjjortunities of seeing some of the most 

 eminent. 



You have no doubt heard of the Society of Arts. It is, to be sure, a body too numerous to 

 rank very high, but it is headed by the most popular of the royal Dukes, and is always spoken 

 of as respectable, at least. I have attended two or three of their meetings, and was astonished 

 at the trash and nonsense I heard. The English are before us in many things, but they owe this 

 to other causes than their superior genius, as they insolently imagine. A nation seen at a great 

 distance either of time or place appears vastly above its true dimensions. John Bull is thought 

 a great deal too much of in America. He is haughty and overbearing, and no friend of ours in 

 any sense of the word, and it is both useless and degrading to coax him ; he would respect us 

 more if we were less humble to him. You are perfectly right in your prediction of some revolu- 

 tion in the system of government in England, and it might be extended to Europe generally. 

 Thrones are preserved by the bayonet now, but it cannot last always. It is astonishing to see 

 the confidence which the English have in their complicate and rickety old government. They 

 say that its fall has been predicted every year for the last half-century, and as it has not taken 

 place yet, they do not believe that it ever will ; as well might a man of seventy hope to live 

 ad infinitum because he had lived so long already. Certainly experience is of all things the 

 most worthy of trust, but the experiment in this case has not been finished. 



Any man who has one drop of the milk of human kindness in his veins must feel sick at 

 heart to see the misery of the poor, contrasted with the useless luxury and extravagance of 

 the rich. The slaves in Virginia are much better fed and clothed than one quarter of the 

 population of this country, and, bating the odium of the term slave, they are to all intents and 

 purposes as well conditioned. 



The following shows the certainty of conclusions drawn from chemical experiments. At 

 a late trial before Lord C. J. Dallas (a fire insurance cause), <£70,000 depended on this ques- 

 tion : " Is it more dangerous to boil sugar (in a sugar-house) by passing heated oil through 

 it in tubes or pipes, than to boil it in the old way ? " namely, by putting the fire directly under 

 the sugar pan or pot. The great guns of chemistry were called in evidence. Parkes, Brande, 

 Accum, and several others, swore that they had made many experiments to ascertain the truth, 

 and they had no doubt but the method by oil was much the least dangerous. Childern, Bos- 

 tock, Faraday, and several others, swore they had made experiments also, and they had no 

 doubt but the oil method was much the most dangerous. Lord Dallas in the charge said : 

 " This is not a day for the triumph of science. The first chemists in the world are brought 

 forward, and they give us no light. When we see them drawn up in hostile array against each 

 other, what are common men like us to do ? For me, my mind is surrounded with doubts 

 which are not likely to be removed by opinions so contradictoiy." 



Ever your friend, 



D. TrEA DWELL. 



